Parque Botânico do Monteiro-Mor

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Parque Botânico do Monteiro-Mor, staircase in the historic garden at the Palácio Angeja-Palmela

The Parque Botânico do Monteiro-Mor is a historical park in the Lumiar district in the north of Lisbon . It was created in the second half of the 18th century, making it one of the oldest botanical gardens in Portugal. The Museu Nacional do Traje ( Costume Museum ) and the Museu Nacional do Teatro , the theater museum of Portugal, are also located on the grounds of the park .

history

In the early 18th century, António de Noronha (1680–1735), second Marquês de Angeja, acquired several properties in Lumiar and put them together to form a larger estate ( Portuguese Quinta ). The history of the park begins with the third Marquês de Angeja, Pedro José de Noronha Camões de Albuquerque Moniz e Sousa (1716–1788), who had the Palácio Angeja-Palmela built on the site, probably from 1754, which is now the seat of the Costume Museum is. He planned to expand it to include a private museum for his extensive natural history collection, a project which, however, could not be realized.

Part of this plan was the creation of a botanical garden on the adjacent parts of the property's agricultural land. During this time, the retaining walls, terraces and staircases on the steep slope towards the park were built in the north of the Palácio Angeja. The course of the stream that runs through the entire property was laid underground in this area and the site was raised by up to six meters in order to gain more level space. Many of the water systems for maintaining the park, such as reservoirs and water pipes, probably date from this time.

The park, which was created towards the end of the third quarter, is one of the three oldest botanical gardens in Portugal , along with the Jardim Botânico da Ajuda (realized from 1768) and the Jardim Botânico da Universidade de Coimbra (from 1774). For the early history of the park are no written records before, planning and concept are the Italian naturalist Domenico Vandelli (1735-1816) attributed , who was since 1765 in Portugal and was also responsible for planning the other two gardens. Nothing is known about the appearance of the garden; according to the ideas of the time, it probably consisted of numerous individual beds, organized according to plant systematic criteria, which were intended to illustrate the development of the plant species. In a report from 1793 the Botanical Garden was described as "one of the three most beautiful gardens in Lisbon and one of the most important collections of plants in the kingdom."

In 1840 the property was purchased by Domingos de Sousa Holstein Beck (1818–1864), second Duque de Palmela, who had shortly before inherited the neighboring Palácio do Monteiro-Mor, now the seat of the National Theater Museum. The current name of the park was taken from this palace and refers to the court office of Monteiro-Mor, which is roughly comparable to that of the Grand Hunters of France and which was one of the previous owners, Fernão Teles da Silva, second Marquês de Alegrete (1662–1731) held.

The Palmela family merged the two properties and lavishly redesigned the park based on the concept of the English Garden : the systematic beds were abandoned, bed borders removed and plantings and pathways changed in favor of a more natural-looking appearance. However, the botanical diversity of the garden was retained and complemented by numerous exotic plants. In 1841 a neo-Gothic bird house was built at the Palácio Angeja , which is now the museum's restaurant.

Renowned botanists were hired to manage and develop the park, the first being the Belgian J. Rosenfeld, who had previously worked in the Paris Jardin des Plantes . After his death in 1844, the Austrian Friedrich Welwitsch took over the management until 1853, who was also responsible for the botanical gardens in Ajuda and Coimbra. He was followed by Jacob Weiss, the Duke's chief gardener since 1847 and previously employed in the Jardin des Plantes in Paris, and managed the garden until 1887. His pupil and successor, João Baptista Possidónio, managed the park for the next 30 years.

A detailed description of the park by the German gardener and botanist Edmund Goeze (1839–1929) exists in the Jornal de horticultura pratica from 1875 . Goeze was staying in Lisbon at this time and was responsible for the plant systematics as chief gardener for the construction of the botanical garden of the Polytechnic (now the University of Lisbon), which opened in 1878 . He praised the garden in Lumiar as a model for many later plants in Portugal, which has not lost its importance to this day. He describes in detail many of the species in the park and reports of setbacks and successes in the cultivation of exotic species.

1969 died with Maria José Holstein Beck Campilho, third Duchess of Palmela, the last resident of the Palácio de Angeja-Palmela, the Palácio do Monteiro-Mor, at the time the seat of the Moroccan embassy, ​​burned to the ground in 1970. In 1976 the Palmela family sold the entire Quinta do Lumiar property to the Portuguese state.

The Museu National do Traje was founded in December and work began on converting the Palácio de Angeja-Palmela into a museum, and it opened in 1977. At the same time the historical garden was restored and opened to the public. The park has been managed by the Museu do Traje ever since. The opening of the Museu National do Teatro in the restored Palácio do Monteiro-Mor took place in 1985. In the 1980s, the agricultural areas of the quinta were reforested, the irrigation system for the park was renewed and the rose and herb gardens were laid out. In 2003/04 the park was upgraded again in a larger project.

description

The 11 hectare park surrounded by a wall is located in the north of Lisbon in the Lumiar district , around 8 km north of Praça do Comércio and 2.5 km west of the airport . To the south extends Cemitério do Lumiar, north of the closes place the golf club Golfe Paço do Lumiar on. In the east, the site of the multi-lane will arterial road Calçada de Carriche limited.

On the southern edge of the park, the two mansions are a good 150 m apart, the Palaçio do Monteiro-Mor in the west and the Palaçio Angeja-Palmela in the east. Between them and to the north towards the park, the terrain slopes sharply, with stairs, terraces and retaining walls creating the transition. A stream running through the park at the foot of the slope from west to east was laid underground below the Palaçio Angeja-Palmela in the middle of the 18th century. The brook is a torrente that only carries large amounts of water in winter and after heavy rainfall; in summer it is only fed by a small spring on the slope. Further to the north, meadows and loose trees characterize the formerly agricultural areas, while in the northeast there are orchards and a large vegetable garden.

The historical garden

Dragon tree

The historical garden is located in the immediate vicinity of the two mansions and on the terraces between them.

To the south in front of the Palácio do Monteiro-Mor is a baroque garden of geometrically planted box hedges with a small fountain in the center. It was replanted in 1976 after garden monument care investigations and corresponds to its appearance in the second half of the 18th century. The departments on the ground floor directly in front of the manor house, bordered by the hedges , now form the rose garden . In the west, there are larger departments that house the herb garden with typical culinary herbs and medicinal plants . This facility is particularly aimed at blind visitors, who can experience the sometimes intense scents; the plants are therefore also labeled in Braille . At the end of the formal garden there is a splendid old dragon tree - but it is not the tree that the German botanist and gardener Edmund Goeze described as one of the oldest and largest examples in Portugal in 1875.

Historical garden, lions pool

The Palácio Angeja-Palmela is located directly on the street in the southeast corner of the park, so its gardens were laid out in the north and west on the terraces on the slope below the palace. The systematic beds of the botanical garden , which are now lost, were located here in the past ; they were embedded in the preserved contemporary baroque garden design with staircases, geometric water basins and box hedges. From 1995, the historical sculptural decoration of the facilities was supplemented by contemporary sculptural work.

The Norfolk fir , which came from Australia and was planted below the central terrace in 1842, was the first tree of its kind in Portugal. Its counterpart on the other side of the terrace is a large copper beech , which was also exotic at the time , and two stately plane trees grow a little further .

Towards the Palácio do Monteiro-Mor, the landscape garden develops around a central pond, a Mexican bald cypress ( Taxodium huegelii ) grows here , the large-leaved fig originally native to Australia and the South American ombu tree with its characteristic rootstocks that have grown together. A small waterfall was created on the slope, the water of which feeds the pond. Other notable species in the park are ginkgo , rosewood tree, or the New Zealand ironwood tree .

Quinta do Luminar

Wooded area on the watercourse

To the north extend the approximately seven hectares of former agricultural land of the Quinta do Lumiar. Traditionally, the Portuguese country estates had, in addition to the representative areas, usable areas such as fields, meadows and pastures as well as a fruit and vegetable garden, but these were included in the design and also used for recreation.

At the watercourse and on the eastern slope there is a relatively natural wooded area , the native plants of which are mainly derived from the location, elms , ash trees , poplars and weeping willows , but also pines grow here . Horticultural interventions are limited here to the occasional pushing back of overly dominant invasive species in order to preserve the natural biodiversity.

In the mid-1980s, the open, agriculturally used areas in the north of the area were reforested , and various light commercial forests ( dehesas ) made of cork oaks or pines, which are typical for central Portugal and Extremadura , were created . In between there grow single trees such as figs and olives and isolated bushes and shrubs. Plantations of plane trees , poplars and horse chestnuts form a loosened meadow and park landscape around a central poor meadow , which is mowed regularly.

Vegetable garden

In the north-west are the vegetable garden and the orchards on three terraces . Numerous citrus fruits such as lemons , oranges , clementines and mandarins are cultivated on the lower terrace , which are easiest to water here in summer. A little above there is an orchard with stone fruits , various types of plums , sloes and apricots grow here . The third orchard is the pome fruit such as apples , pears , but also persimmons reserved. Other fruit trees such as walnut or almond trees can also be found in other areas of the park.

The vegetable garden , which is a good one hectare in size , is used intensively; every year the plots are given to interested parties who can cultivate them for their own use. The individual parcels are not fenced in and accessed through a shared network of paths that are also open to all visitors to the park. Vegetables such as cabbage, beans, onions and aubergines , but also fruits and flowers are grown.

fauna

The hoopoe populates meadow and park landscapes with loose trees.

With its many different landscapes, the park offers a habitat for a multitude of native wild animals, especially for many bird species.

Water frogs and fire salamanders live by the stream , the dense undergrowth offers the wren protection and nesting opportunities . The ponds with their numerous carp and goldfish kept as ornamental fish attract gray and night herons , the native and strictly protected Moorish brook turtle lives here together with North American jewelery turtles and mallards and pond claws that are exposed by visitors . The walls are the habitat for the wall lizards and the nocturnal wall gecko , which, like the ring snake and the horseshoe snake, also inhabit the dry grassland. The cork oak forests are home to stair snakes , Portuguese millipedes , rhinoceros beetles and fireflies at the edges of the forest . Originally immigrated from Africa, the wavy cone , ring-necked parakeet and hoopoe , with buzzard and tawny owl , birds of prey can also be observed in the park.

A special feature is a colony of around 200 long-winged bats , which find shelter in the vaults below the Palácio Angeja-Palmela, but there are also piped bats in the park.

gallery

  • Water basin with a sculpture by Minoru Niizuma

  • Garden gate

literature

Web links

Commons : Parque Botânico do Monteiro-Mor  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Palácio dos Marqueses de Angeja / Museu Nacional do Traje - Cronologia in the Sistema de Informação para o Património Arquitectónico (Portuguese).
  2. ↑ cf. Park Guide, 2015, p. 62.
  3. ↑ Parque da Quinta do Monteiro-Mor / Parque do Monteiro-Mor - Cronologia in the Sistema de Informação para o Património Arquitectónico (Portuguese)
  4. ↑ cf. the park guide; the list of monuments (SIPA) gives in No. 3158, Parque do Monteiro-Mor, the name with J. Rosenfelder, but is also wrong with Jacob Weiss, who is called Jacob Weist here.
  5. ↑ Edmond Goeze: Jardins Notaveis de Portugal - Lumiar. In: Jornal de horticultura pratica. Vol. 6, No. 12, 1875, pp. 230-235 (Portuguese); see. also the evaluation of this article with a systematic listing of the species mentioned in: Gerald Luckhurst: Lumiar 1875. Jardim Formoso Blog, January 24, 2009 (English).
  6. ↑ Edmond Goeze: Jardins Notaveis de Portugal - Lumiar. In: Jornal de horticultura pratica. Vol. 6, No. 12, 1875, p. 232; see. the museum's park guide, 2015, p. 84.
  7. ↑ cf. Aurora Carapinha: A Quinta de Recreio. Diário de Notícias , April 21, 2008 (Portuguese).

Coordinates: 38 ° 46 ′ 30 ″  N , 9 ° 9 ′ 57 ″  W.